Julia Henderson 10/19/14

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Quarter 1 Play Review: Fetch Clay Make Man

I saw the play Fetch Clay Make Man By Will Power on October 11th at Round House
Theater. The play explores the unlikely friendship between two African American cultural icons
with very different public identities. Despite such difference they find that their true characters
and personal identities are similar.
During 1965, Muslim heavyweight boxing champion Cassius Clay also known as
Muhammad Ali invites actor Stepin Fetchit to join him in Lewiston, Maine hoping hell teach
him Jack Johnsons secret anchor punch before his upcoming match against Liston. Unaware of
Alis plans, Fetchit proposes that they both make a movie together as his last chance of making it
back in the TV industry. Meanwhile Alis security guard, Brother Rachi -also Muslim- doesnt
like his new partner (since his TV roles depicted a lazy slave) and tries to get rid of Fetchit along
with Alis wife, Sanji, whom he thinks arent good for Ali since neither are true Muslims.
Leading up to the match, Clay and Fetchit spend time together and get to know each other.
Meanwhile, Sanji begins to stop dressing as a Muslim women and Cassuis also learns that Sanji
has had serious relationships with other men. He decides to end their relationship as he wants a
wife that is a born Muslim. Just before the match, Fetchit shows Ali the famous anchor punch
and Ali heads to the ring. Preparing to leave for the match, Fetchit encounters Rachi who
threatens him and forces him to stay in Alis training room and watch it on TV instead. In the
first round against Liston, Ali lands the anchor punch and makes a historic win. The historical
context and personalities of the main characters are successful in depicting the plays theme.
The five actors all do a great job of becoming their characters. Eddie Ray Jackson -as
Ali- pantomimes punching his boxing bag, to show that he is preparing for the match. Jackson
does seem to be a bit too straight forward though and lacks emotional subtext. He doesnt do a

Julia Henderson 10/19/14

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great job of showing stress of worry. Roscoe Orman as Stepin Fetchit however has good use of
emotional subtext and seems very reminiscent of his days in Hollywood. The two actors do a
good job of creating a realistic friendship and their conversations seem to come naturally instead
of sounding scripted. They both use the fourth wall very often during their long monologues as
well. Katherine Turner as Sanji has the accurate physicality of a young, fun-loving woman.
Jefferson Russell as Brother Rachi depicts a high status body guard very well by acting serious
and purposefully lacking emotion. All of the actors have incredible line memoritation.
The set of the play by Courtney ONeill includs lockers, a couch, towels and sports
awards to create a concrete basement used by Ali as a training and hang out room. The costumes
by Heidi Hanson are accurate to the time period. The men wear pants with built-in belts and old
fashioned hats and dress-up shoes. Ali wares his boxing shorts or sweatpants and sweatshirt with
old fashioned boxing boots and his wife wares her traditional Muslim dress and head covering.
For scenes outside the training room, Colin Bills shines lights on and the actors who are staged
by Derrick Sanders to stand behind transparent curtains. Caite Kemp, the projection designer
also projects backdrops such as brick walls or the William Fox Studio onto the curtains and
overhead screens during some scenes. In between scenes, images and music from the time period
play to keep the audiences attention. In the scene where Ali learns the anchor punch, slave
spirituals are played in the background along with punching sound effects by Christopher Baine
to make it seem like Ali is going to make black history. A critique of the staging is that the play
seemed to be facing one direction of the audience the whole time. On the side of the audience in
which I was sitting, Fetchit was constantly upstaging Ali. The one bit of choreography in the
play though, when Fetchit teaches Ali a short dance is well synchronized to create the effect that
the two men are similar characters even though theyre of different ages.